CHAPTER IX.
THE FUCHSIA.
The Fuchsia needs no praise, and strange to say, there is not much to be said on the subject of its cultivation. At all events it is our intention to dispose of the matter in a few words, and we shall have to include in a short chapter all that really need be said about it. If we hammer too hard and too long on a soft subject, we shall probably crush it out of all identification, and none of our readers would wish to see the fuchsia obliterated by needlessly prolix directions for its cultivation.
The fuchsia requires to be grown rather fast, and therefore a starving system must not be practised. It loves warmth and moisture and some amount of sunshine. It cannot endure a dry soil or a dry air and a long-continued roasting glare of sunshine. No matter whether you wish to grow nice little bushes for a small greenhouse or the sitting-room window, or giant pyramids for a flower-show, the routine practice will be very nearly the same, and the few differences to be made will be taken note of in the directions that follow.
If grand specimens are desired take cuttings in September, but if only plants of moderate size, take them in spring as soon as you can get them. In the month of February prune a few old plants into shape and put them in a temperature of 60°, and keep them regularly syringed. In the course of a month they will supply you with any number of cuttings, and to strike these is the simplest task in propagating the greenhouse will ever afford you.
At the earliest moment the cuttings should be potted off into small sixties and soon after be shifted into forty-eights, then into twenty-fours, and, lastly, into eights or sixes. The size of the final shift must be determined upon by the cultivator, but if very large plants are wanted the last size is the
